Well, tonight we got to see what the bar is at in high school tennis in South Carolina. Fort Mill lived up to my expectations and I feel that they are slightly underrated in the state rankings compared to the others that I saw while in Aiken earlier this year. Frankly, if they play like they did tonight in playoffs, we may have just seen the 2008 state champions on our courts tonight. Comparing them to Spartanburg (#3), I would assume they are about even at 1 & 2 singles, and ahead of them the rest of the way down, especially 2 doubles.
I hope that we use this match as motivation for the rest of the season and the future. Fort Mill is playing at a level that I want us to be at. I don't know if it will be possible to get there this year, but for our younger players I hope you took note of what we could become with hard work and dedication to the sport. Fort Mill's Line 4 (usual line 5) was hitting serves with accuracy and speed that we normally only see at a 1 or 2 in our region. 2 doubles was extremely well coached and displayed exceptional teamwork.
We are now placed into a tie for third place in region with Rock Hill and we will square it off with them on Tuesday next week to complete round 1 of region matches. I mentioned to the boys that they have practice off tomorrow & Saturday to spend time with their families over the holiday as I will be doing the same. I do hope that all of them are able to find a court over the weekend to keep the racquets swinging. We will have to play a high level of tennis on Tuesday to beat a good Rock Hill team. With a 50% chance of showers on Monday, I'd like it if we all found hitting time over the weekend before we head over to Rock Hill High.
Go Trojans!
Box Score:
Location: Northwestern HS
Result: Fort Mill 7, Northwestern 0
1S: William Reigel (F) def Jeff Zimmerman (N) 6-0, 6-0
2S: Robbie Davis (F) def Seth Russell (N) 6-0, 6-0
3S: Kyle Orsman (F) def Paul Sabisch (N) 6-1, 6-0
4S: Chase Lee (F) def Zach Beaver (N) 6-3, 6-3
5S: Jordon Lukens (F) def Brian Fitzpatrick (N) 6-3, 6-4
1D: Reigel/R Davis (F) def Zimmerman/Russell (N) 8-2
2D: Daniel Proctor/Tyler Davis (F) def Alex Atzberger/Drayton Wade (N) 6-3, 6-1
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
USTA tournaments over spring break
For those of you that are going to be in the area over spring break, here are a couple options for tennis opportunities sponsored by the USTA:
April 4 - 6, 2008 - Holly Tree Junior Tennis Bash
Holly Tree Golf Club, Simpsonville SC (1 hr, 40 min drive from school) (864) 967-9516
Entries open until 3/31 to all USTA members
Entry Fee is $41.35 per player, no doubles draw
Link: http://tennislink.usta.com/tournaments/TournamentHome/Tournament.aspx?T=63608
- or -
April 4-6, 2008 - Woodside Plantation Junior Challenger
Woodside Plantation Country Club, Aiken SC (Where we ate dinner in Aiken, 2 hour 16 min drive from school) (803) 641-7974
Entries open until 3/31 to all USTA members
Entry Fee is $28 for singles and $8 additional to play doubles per player
Link: http://tennislink.usta.com/tournaments/TournamentHome/Tournament.aspx?T=63903
April 11 - 13, 2008 - Rock Hill City Championships at the Come-see-me Festival
Rock Hill Tennis Center
Entries open until 4/6/2008 to all USTA members
Entry Fee is $35 for singles & additional $3 for doubles
Link: http://tennislink.usta.com/tournaments/TournamentHome/Tournament.aspx?T=68733
April 4 - 6, 2008 - Holly Tree Junior Tennis Bash
Holly Tree Golf Club, Simpsonville SC (1 hr, 40 min drive from school) (864) 967-9516
Entries open until 3/31 to all USTA members
Entry Fee is $41.35 per player, no doubles draw
Link: http://tennislink.usta.com/tournaments/TournamentHome/Tournament.aspx?T=63608
- or -
April 4-6, 2008 - Woodside Plantation Junior Challenger
Woodside Plantation Country Club, Aiken SC (Where we ate dinner in Aiken, 2 hour 16 min drive from school) (803) 641-7974
Entries open until 3/31 to all USTA members
Entry Fee is $28 for singles and $8 additional to play doubles per player
Link: http://tennislink.usta.com/tournaments/TournamentHome/Tournament.aspx?T=63903
April 11 - 13, 2008 - Rock Hill City Championships at the Come-see-me Festival
Rock Hill Tennis Center
Entries open until 4/6/2008 to all USTA members
Entry Fee is $35 for singles & additional $3 for doubles
Link: http://tennislink.usta.com/tournaments/TournamentHome/Tournament.aspx?T=68733
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Northwestern falls to Clover 2-5
In a heartbreaker of a match, we fell to the Eagles of Clover tonight 5-2. With the loss Northwestern drops to 5-3 overall and 4-1 in region.
Highlighting the effort for Northwestern was Jeff Zimmerman's performance at 1 singles. Jeff stormed out to a 6-0 first set and seemed to have it on cruise control. He must have tapped the brakes at the beginning of set 2 as cruise control came off when he and the Clover opponent traded games all the way to 6-6 to force a tiebreaker in the second set. Jeff fell behind 4-1 in the tiebreak, but came back with strong serves and a mini-break to get to 5-4 and finished the tiebreak out for our first line win.
Unfortunately, we dropped lines 2, 3, and 4 in fairly decissive fashion. Seth Russell dropped a 2-6, 2-6 decision at 2 singles. Alex Atzberger and Zach Beaver lost by identical 6-1, 6-0 scores at 3 and 4 singles respectively.
Here is where decision time came for me as coach. On 2 doubles, I could see that Brian Fitzpatrick & Eric Sabin had just come back to win their second set 6-4 after dropping the first 7-5. At the same time, I was watching Drayton Wade as he was down in the second set 4-5 and bordering on a split set situation as well unless he could pull off the second set with a comeback. I hoped that I could cheer Drayton on to a comeback win in the second and still make it over to the doubles match to pull for Brian & Eric.
Drayton had played an excellent first set and won it 6-3. The second set had see-sawed back and forth and the Clover opponent took the second set 6-7 in a close tiebreak. On to yet another 10-point tiebreak went Drayton at this point to decide his match. My update from doubles was that we were down big, so it was not looking good for us at this point. Drayton's tiebreak 3rd set was handled by him in stellar fashion. Drayton went up 4-1 before dropping a point for a 4-2 score at the changeover. That would prove to be the last time Drayton would change sides as he claimed the next 6 points to close out our second point 10-2.
The doubles match with Brian and Eric had ended by this point with us dropping the match 5-7, 6-4, 1-10 to clinch the 4th point for Clover.
Seth had been on stand-by waiting to play doubles with Jeff if we had a decisive point to play out at 1 doubles. Being that the match was decided, I sent Seth off to his band concert where Alex was already and paired up Thunder Beaver with Jeff to have some fun playing doubles. Clover paired their #1 with their #3 as an opponent. For those of you that got to see Alex's match at 3 singles, you could probably foresee an enjoyable scenario unwinding....The battle of the underhand serves. Zach has been working on an underhand heavy spin serve that he throws in every now and then and Clover's #3 has a similar shot in his bag.
I was pleased that we were competitive in the 1 doubles line even though we lost it fairly big 8-4. Seeing as Zach has never played doubles and Jeff was playing with an unfamiliar partner, I think there is potential if the two need to be paired in the future.
The Trojans will remain at home to take on Fort Mill on Thursday. Fort Mill is currently ranked #10 in the state and has been impressive in region matches without dropping a point yet. We'll hit the courts tomorrow (or mini-gym at 4:45 if rain) to strategize how we're going to attack them and have at it Thursday.
Go Trojans!
Box Score:
1S: Jeff Zimmerman (N) def Chase Altieri (C) 6-0, 7-6
2S: Nick Deahl (C) def Seth Russell (N) 6-2, 6-2
3S: Ken Long (C) def Alex Atzberger (N) 6-1, 6-0
4S: Will Decker (C) def Zach Beaver (N) 6-1, 6-0
5S: Drayton Wade (N) def Josh Watts (C) 6-3, 6-7, 10-2
1D: Altieri/Long (C) def Zimmerman/Beaver (N) 8-4
2D: Tucker DeLoach/J.C. Dougherty (C) def Brian Fitzpatrick/Eric Sabin(N) 5-7, 6-4, 10-1
Highlighting the effort for Northwestern was Jeff Zimmerman's performance at 1 singles. Jeff stormed out to a 6-0 first set and seemed to have it on cruise control. He must have tapped the brakes at the beginning of set 2 as cruise control came off when he and the Clover opponent traded games all the way to 6-6 to force a tiebreaker in the second set. Jeff fell behind 4-1 in the tiebreak, but came back with strong serves and a mini-break to get to 5-4 and finished the tiebreak out for our first line win.
Unfortunately, we dropped lines 2, 3, and 4 in fairly decissive fashion. Seth Russell dropped a 2-6, 2-6 decision at 2 singles. Alex Atzberger and Zach Beaver lost by identical 6-1, 6-0 scores at 3 and 4 singles respectively.
Here is where decision time came for me as coach. On 2 doubles, I could see that Brian Fitzpatrick & Eric Sabin had just come back to win their second set 6-4 after dropping the first 7-5. At the same time, I was watching Drayton Wade as he was down in the second set 4-5 and bordering on a split set situation as well unless he could pull off the second set with a comeback. I hoped that I could cheer Drayton on to a comeback win in the second and still make it over to the doubles match to pull for Brian & Eric.
Drayton had played an excellent first set and won it 6-3. The second set had see-sawed back and forth and the Clover opponent took the second set 6-7 in a close tiebreak. On to yet another 10-point tiebreak went Drayton at this point to decide his match. My update from doubles was that we were down big, so it was not looking good for us at this point. Drayton's tiebreak 3rd set was handled by him in stellar fashion. Drayton went up 4-1 before dropping a point for a 4-2 score at the changeover. That would prove to be the last time Drayton would change sides as he claimed the next 6 points to close out our second point 10-2.
The doubles match with Brian and Eric had ended by this point with us dropping the match 5-7, 6-4, 1-10 to clinch the 4th point for Clover.
Seth had been on stand-by waiting to play doubles with Jeff if we had a decisive point to play out at 1 doubles. Being that the match was decided, I sent Seth off to his band concert where Alex was already and paired up Thunder Beaver with Jeff to have some fun playing doubles. Clover paired their #1 with their #3 as an opponent. For those of you that got to see Alex's match at 3 singles, you could probably foresee an enjoyable scenario unwinding....The battle of the underhand serves. Zach has been working on an underhand heavy spin serve that he throws in every now and then and Clover's #3 has a similar shot in his bag.
I was pleased that we were competitive in the 1 doubles line even though we lost it fairly big 8-4. Seeing as Zach has never played doubles and Jeff was playing with an unfamiliar partner, I think there is potential if the two need to be paired in the future.
The Trojans will remain at home to take on Fort Mill on Thursday. Fort Mill is currently ranked #10 in the state and has been impressive in region matches without dropping a point yet. We'll hit the courts tomorrow (or mini-gym at 4:45 if rain) to strategize how we're going to attack them and have at it Thursday.
Go Trojans!
Box Score:
1S: Jeff Zimmerman (N) def Chase Altieri (C) 6-0, 7-6
2S: Nick Deahl (C) def Seth Russell (N) 6-2, 6-2
3S: Ken Long (C) def Alex Atzberger (N) 6-1, 6-0
4S: Will Decker (C) def Zach Beaver (N) 6-1, 6-0
5S: Drayton Wade (N) def Josh Watts (C) 6-3, 6-7, 10-2
1D: Altieri/Long (C) def Zimmerman/Beaver (N) 8-4
2D: Tucker DeLoach/J.C. Dougherty (C) def Brian Fitzpatrick/Eric Sabin(N) 5-7, 6-4, 10-1
Monday, March 17, 2008
4/3 Match against Nation Ford rescheduled
We would have been down to 6 players on 4/3 had the accomodating coach at Nation Ford not agreed to change our match date. Apparently, our team will have several attendees at the Model UN conference at Winthrop on this date. After consulting with the team, I pushed for a match date with Nation Ford after our Spring Break.
The match will now be played on Friday 4/18 at 5PM at Nation Ford High School.
The match will now be played on Friday 4/18 at 5PM at Nation Ford High School.
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